


Hunith's Yule

by doomcanary



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: M/M, Meet the Family, Unconventional Families, Yuletide 2008
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-20
Updated: 2014-03-20
Packaged: 2018-01-16 08:23:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,779
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1338646
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/doomcanary/pseuds/doomcanary
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Arthur and Merlin visit Hunith for Yule. It couldn't go well, really, could it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hunith's Yule

Hunith comes running out of her house dusting her hands on her apron, as an extraordinary thundering of hooves and feet comes towards the house, accompaned by the gleeful shouts of the village children. She stops dead outside the door, and her mouth drops open; there's a small army of colourfully liveried servants milling about in the street, some carrying banners on poles, and a knot of guardsmen in chainmail standing foursquare to the rear. Slap in the centre of the crowd is the unmistakable figure of Prince Arthur, still mounted on a great proud bay horse, that fair hair seeming to draw all the light of the December day into itself.

“Mum!” shouts Merlin's voice, and he comes threading his way through the mass to throw his arms round her.

“Merlin, what in heaven is going on?” is the first thing she can say. “When I asked you and Arthur to visit for Yuletide I didn't mean -”

Merlin's face falls a little. At that moment, Arthur appears beside him, and Hunith desperately drops a curtsey.

“Hunith, please,” says Arthur. “There's no need for that.”

“But Merlin, a royal visit, I can't -”

“Mum, it's OK,” says Merlin. “They're not staying. Are they, Arthur?” He shoots Arthur a look. Hunith is startled to see Prince Arthur stiffen, and colour slightly.

“Of course they're not,” he says. “They'll come back for us in a week.”

There's a pause. Out of the corner of her eye Hunith sees Merlin glaring at Arthur.

“Excuse me a moment,” says the Prince. He marches off to the mass of servants and guards, and his voice can be distantly heard giving orders. Hunith catches something about _pack up_ and _don't let me catch sight of you again_ before Merlin speaks, more loudly than is strictly necessary given that he's standing next to her.

“We brought you something,” he says. “See those bits of wood?”

“What are they?” asks Hunith.

“It's a bed,” says Merlin. “Like the ones we have in Camelot.”

“Oh, Merlin!” she says, instantly overwhelmed again. “I can't accept that!”

“Wait till you've tried it,” says Merlin, grinning his old, mischievous grin.

That, to Hunith, is much more familiar ground. “What about everyone else in the village?” she says reprovingly. “I can't take favours from Camelot and leave everyone else out in the cold.”

“Well, if you like it, I'll have beds made for every household,” says Arthur, reappearing. There's a very faint hint of desperation to his tone.

“I'm sure it'll be fine, Arthur,” says Merlin, with a bit of an edge in his voice. Hunith, astonished, watches the Prince of Camelot wilt under her son's gaze again.

“And if it's not,” goes on Merlin, “we can take it away again when we leave. Can't we?”

“Yes,” says Arthur, squaring his shoulders. He looks positively woeful. “Yes, of course we can.”

 

 

“Arthur, I told you she'd be upset if we turned up with a whole cavalcade,” hisses Merlin, as he shoves a bundle of clothes into Arthur's arms, and picks up the sheets for Hunith's new bed himself.

“Merlin, it's a royal visit -”

“No, Arthur, it's you coming home for Yule, and we only talked the King into it by telling him we were going to meet Lord Thingy with the horrible breath about a border dispute.”

“I'm a prince,” says Arthur helplessly. “I can't get away from all this!”

“You can here,” says Merlin, and for a moment, Arthur sees an echo of Hunith in the stubbornness and determination in his face. He sets off towards the house, Arthur feeling like the servant as he tags along beside.

 

 

“Good heavens,” says Hunith, as Merlin and Arthur lift the straw-stuffed mattress onto the newly assembled bed. “It's huge!”

“It is on the big side,” says Merlin.

“Well, I thought it might do for visitors too,” says Arthur.

“You could fit a whole family in there,” says Hunith. Arthur shoots a startled glance at Merlin; Merlin raises his eyebrows in a way that says _I told you so_.

“Well,” he says to her, “maybe if you take old man Harding from Elmlow up on his offer, you will do.”

“Merlin!” she laughs, blushing.

“Come on,” says Merlin. “What's for dinner?”

“I might have known you'd eat me out of house and home,” she smiles.

“Dinner?” echoes Arthur, brightening.

 

 

Arthur offers to help Hunith cook, and she accepts; so he ends up inexpertly chopping carrots as she seems to do six things at once, stirring pots and turning bread as it bakes beside the hearth and ordering him about with a precision and a commanding air that would grace any knight of Camelot. He's not particularly good at anything she asks him to do, but somehow her kindness means he doesn't mind that. She even lets him knead the bread a bit; the feel of the dough in his fingers is quite pleasant, in an odd way.

“I'm afraid the bed was my idea,” he says awkwardly. “I'm, er, not really used to sleeping on the floor.”

Hunith stands back, a wooden spoon in her hand, and gives him a long look.

“I don't think I'd expect you to be, your highness,” she says.

“Hunith, please, don't call me that – Merlin's right, we're really not here for -”

He trails off as Hunith continues to look at him amusedly, and he realises she was making a point.

“Right,” he says. “Er, what else needs doing?”

“I think I can take it from here,” says Hunith. “Why don't you go and find Merlin? I don't know where he's got to, and it'll be ready soon.”

Arthur knows a dismissal when he hears one, and he flees gratefully, suddenly understanding how his soldiers feel at the end of a long day.

 

 

He finds Merlin outside, standing by the gate that leads out into the field at the back, resting his hands on the low wattle fence. A warning bell sounds in his mind; Merlin's shoulders are hunched, and he doesn't look happy. He ducks out of the door, and goes to stand beside him. Merlin glances at him, and then looks away again, across the field.

“Will and me set a haystack on fire by accident once,” he says. “Over there.”

There's a desolate depth in his voice; Arthur had been afraid this would be waiting for them, once they came back here. He puts his arm around Merlin's shoulders and pulls him roughly against his side.

“It's all right,” he says.

“Is he your gay boyfriend?” says a sneering little voice behind them. There's a ten-year-old kid hanging over the fence that borders the lane. Arthur turns round, abruptly furious.

“Well he's hardly going to be my straight one, is he,” he snaps.

“You going to be queen instead of king then?”

Arthur makes an aggressive move towards the boy. He runs off.

“Wulric's son,” says Merlin, in an unsteady voice. “Always was a little shit.”

“Merlin,” says Arthur, and pulls Merlin into a proper hug. Merlin sniffs, and squeezes Arthur's ribs.

“I knew we should have asked Hunith to come to Camelot,” Arthur says.

“She'd never have left,” says Merlin, into Arthur's shoulder.

Arthur sighs. “Next time, I'll make it a royal decree.”

“Arthur -”

“I wouldn't, Merlin, you know that.” He pauses. “I just don't like seeing you – like this.”

Merlin drops his head onto Arthur's shoulder. “It's not much fun,” he says, a bit thickly. Arthur rubs his back in slow circles.

Hunith comes out of the house, looking for them; she sees them, and Arthur feels himself flush, but he meets her eyes. For a moment she looks utterly shocked; but then the same determination Arthur sees in Merlin's face comes over hers, and she gives him a decisive nod, and a tight smile that speaks of rather more respect than she had for his culinary skills. She turns, and goes back inside.

“I think dinner's ready,” says Arthur. “Come on.”

He keeps his hand on Merlin's back, shepherding him in.

 

 

Merlin's subdued when the two of them come in, but he brightens a bit as Hunith sets a bowl in front of him, and by the time he's eaten it he's almost back to his usual self again. She doesn't miss the way Arthur tastes the stew as if he's expecting to hate it, but she's gratified when his eyebrows shoot up and he scoops up another spoonful. The rest of it disappears with impressive speed, for someone who's supposed to have perfect manners; Hunith smiles to herself. Boys are boys, even when they're princes, it seems.

“Thankyou,” says Arthur, sitting back and pushing his plate away. “That was wonderful.”

“I'm glad,” says Hunith.

“There was even meat in it,” says Merlin teasingly. “Lucky.”

Arthur glances at him. The affection is unmistakable.

“I've been thinking,” says Hunith. “Perhaps you two would like to take the bed tonight.”

Merlin looks up at her in surprise, and then glances at Arthur with dawning horror. Arthur meets his eyes with an apologetic look.

“Mum!” says Merlin, blushing.

“Love is nothing to be ashamed of,” says Hunith firmly. Both of them turn crimson at that, and look anywhere but at each other; there's a distinctly awkward pause. But then Arthur, still scarlet and looking away, straightens himself and puts his hand over Merlin's on the tabletop. After a moment, Merlin curls his fingers round Arthur's, looks down embarrassedly, and smiles. Hunith feels a swell of pride; for Merlin's happiness, and for Arthur's courage.

“Told you she'd know,” her son says to the prince of Camelot.

 

 

“All three of us could share, I suppose,” she says later.

“Er -” says Arthur, looking rather wild-eyed.

“Oh you don't want to share the bed with him,” says Merlin, jerking his head at Arthur. “Sprawls all over the place and clouts you with his elbows.”

Hunith raises her eyebrows, amused. Merlin realises what he's just said, and turns pink again.

“I can't help my royal upbringing,” says Arthur, defusing the moment. “I'm supposed to assert myself.”

“You can have the bed, then, Arthur, and Merlin and me will take the floor.”

“Mum, don't be daft, we got it for you, we'll be fine -”

In the end Hunith does persuade them into sleeping in the bed. Arthur looks startlingly boyish in his oversized white nightshirt; and both of them blush like virgins, and won't get under the covers until she's put the candle out.

 

 

“I still feel weird seeing a bed in my mum's house,” says Merlin quietly.

Arthur rolls over, and puts his hand on Merlin's hip. “Let alone being in it?”

“Keep talking like that, someone might realise you're not an insensitive pig,” says Merlin, a smile in his voice in the dark.

Arthur slides his hand up until he finds Merlin's face, and kisses him gently.

“Goodnight,” he says.

Merlin hesitates, then flings his arm over Arthur, and cuddles into his side. Arthur tries to ignore how much he loves it when Merlin does that. It's the hot meal, probably; always does wonders for morale. Especially when it's his own. He can't get rid of the smile, though.

“Goodnight,” he says.

 

 

Merlin wakes the next day in pale dawn light, warm and content; Arthur is stirring beside him, his weight making the ropes underneath the mattress creak. He turns lazily, slides his hand over Merlin's side; it makes his skin tingle, and he sighs and shifts.

Arthur rolls over, props himself up and leans over him, and Merlin is pressed down into the bed by his immense weight; he spreads his hand on Arthur's chest, the breadth of his shoulders vast in the borderless land of half-sleep. Arthur kisses him, and Merlin opens to his hands and to his tongue, with a low breathy sound.

He hears a sound drift in from the window, the steady bite of an axe into wood. Eldred's husband chopping wood, the same way he does every day. Arthur's running his hand down Merlin's side, waking a slow coil of desire in him.

Eldred. Wood. Wakefulness hits him like cold water. Camelot's pale walls and rich draperies vanish from behind his eyelids, replaced by the rough stones of Ealdor and the crackle of his mother's hearth. He starts and squirms.

“What?” grumbles Arthur sleepily.

“Arthur,” he says, shoving ineffectually. “Wake _up_ , we're not at home -”

Arthur freezes, suddenly coming to in the abrupt way he has. Merlin siezes the opportunity and wriggles out from underneath him. Arthur gives him a look of utter betrayal, and lets himself drop face-first into the pillow with a sigh. The door unlatches, and Merlin whips the blanket over the telltale situation in his lap just in time.

“I wondered when you two were going to surface,” says Hunith's voice. “There's porridge on the hearthside, and I made some bread for Arthur.”

Arthur opens one eye in time to see Merlin give him a knowing look and a nod. Really, he's starting to be almost glad he never had a mother; she might have been able to read minds too.

 

 

Today is Yule eve, and short of the decorating there isn't much to be done. Hunith sends them out to find some holly and things to cheer the place up.

“Are you going to have sex?” asks a small girl, staring at them curiously as they go down towards the lane end. “Wulfstan says you're gay.”

“No, we're going to pick holly.”

“Can I come?”

“No.”

“You're going to have sex.”

“Mildred, what are they doing?” says another girl, coming over.

“They're going into the woods to have sex.”

“You two can come and help us carry all the holly if you like. We'll give you all the prickly bits.”

Which is how Merlin and Arthur end up in the woods with two diminutive assistants. Arthur finds the mistletoe first, and demands a kiss from both of them. They giggle a lot.

“Didn't think you had it in you,” says Merlin.

“There's a thought,” says Arthur quietly. Merlin flashes him a look.

“Time to go back, kids,” he says. “Come on.”

They spend a while pricking their fingers and swearing under their breath as they deck out Hunith's walls with evergreen and holly, and then Merlin says, “We're off for a walk, Mum, see you for dinner,” and drags Arthur out of the back door.

“Aren't the woods that way?” says Arthur quietly.

“You want another entourage?” says Merlin. “First, distraction.”

“So you do have a tactical mind after all,” says Arthur.

“Keep your head down, you prat,” says Merlin, as they sneak up behind the pig pen fence. Merlin reaches round and unfastens the gate, and pushes it open a little way. They sneak back round to where the pigs are, dozing in a heap of straw, and Merlin reaches into the long grass by the fence and withdraws a sharp stick.

“You've done this before,” says Arthur.

“What, me? Never.” Merlin pokes the stick through the fence and gives the pigs a rude awakening. Squeals and thrashing ensue as Merlin and Arthur dash away, crouching low to the ground. They're nearly at the lane end before they hear a shout of “The pigs are out!” and a string of childish squeals. They collapse against a tree, the trunk between them and the village, and Arthur cautiously peeks out. The street is chaos – kids running around everywhere, gleefully chasing after three hysterical pigs, while adults shout at the kids, uproot fence panels in the attempt to herd the pigs back into their pen, and fail to catch either of them.

“Worked like a charm,” says Arthur.

“Never fails,” says Merlin. “They'll be at it for at least half an hour, they're hopeless. Come on.”

They go deeper into the woods; and find themselves under the tree with the mistletoe in it again. Arthur grins, and pins Merlin up against its trunk.

“Thought you'd never ask,” says Merlin. His lips are chilly; the heat of his mouth is all the more intense for the contrast. He yelps and squirms as Arthur pushes a hand under his shirt – his leather gloves are cold too.

“They'll warm up,” says Arthur, and slides his hand into Merlin's breeches instead. There, the chill makes him shudder and moan.

“About that thought you had,” he says breathily.

“In the middle of the woods?”

“Yeah,” says Merlin. “Where do you think the rest of the kids do it round here?”

Arthur looks at him for a moment, then quirks his eyebrows.

“Good enough for me,” he says, and brings a little bottle out of his doublet. Merlin double-takes, and bursts out laughing.

“You dirty bastard,” he says.

“All part of the service,” says Arthur, and slides down to his knees. Merlin gasps as first cold air, then Arthur's hot wet mouth, engulf his cock.

“Arthur, gods,” he says. “Get inside me, will you.”

Arthur turns him round – one-handed, and it turns him on so much that Arthur's that strong – and pulls his breeches down. Merlin gasps, the bark of the tree rough and cold against his cheek, pushing back against the burn of the slick finger Arthur presses into him. One becomes two, and he's aching for a hand around his cock, loose in the cold air, as he rocks back onto Arthur's hand.

“I swear you're the biggest whore in Camelot,” murmurs Arthur into his ear. “Ready for me, slut?”

“Oh yeah,” says Merlin, and then Arthur's sliding into him, Merlin's groaning and digging his nails into the bark of the tree, caught between the burn and the knowledge of pleasure to come. Arthur's hand closes round his cock, still cold in that leather glove, and he bucks, drawing a sound from Arthur. And then Arthur starts to move, Merlin's cock sliding through his hand as Arthur's thrusts move him, and all Merlin can do is breathe like he's coming up for air, and work himself back against Arthur, and come.

Arthur gives a strangled moan and holds Merlin tight as he clamps down around Arthur's cock, shaking; his knees try to give, and Arthur holds him up, incredibly warm against his back. Merlin's body relaxes, and Arthur starts to move again; slowly at first, till Merlin twists himself to look into Arthur's eyes and says “Come for me.”

Arthur's eyes go feral at that and he buries his face in Merlin's neck, holding his hips hard and fucking him. Merlin's still sensitive, and he feels every inch; Arthur stiffens and makes a sharp, groaning noise, and Merlin feels him pulsing. It makes his knees go weak all over again; the Prince unravelled, undone, all for a village boy with innocent eyes. They sit down, on the cold dry ground at the tree bole, Merlin in Arthur's arms; they're both flushed and dopey, twining themselves together without words.

“Today is tolerable,” decides Arthur after a while.

“Mmm,” smiles Merlin.

 

 

All too soon, Yule is over and done with; the fat duck they brought with them is bones boiling up for stock, and Hunith and Arthur have come to a kind of silent understanding about the fact that while Hunith is desperately proud that her son has found love, she'd really rather not catch him with his hand down a prince's britches in the house.

Of course, when Arthur's cavalcade does reappear it's not as simple as just leaving to go home. At the head of the column, dour as the winter landscape in his brown doublet with its metal studs, is Uther. The first Arthur and Merlin know of this is the King's cold voice demanding to know where the house of Hunith is. Arthur freezes at the sound; Hunith sees a hunted look flicker across his face, before it closes down completely. He gets up from the table with brisk and perfect grace, and goes outside. For the first time since their arrival, Hunith feels uncomfortable, as though her home isn't good enough for the prince to set foot in. Merlin touches her shoulder gently.

 

 

“Here, Father,” Arthur says.

“Arthur.” Uther doesn't even get down off his horse; rides it over, and stands there looking down at his son. “What is the meaning of this?”

Arthur stares back at him silently, shoulders back, blue eyes radiating arrogance.

“You will mount up and leave with me,” says Uther. “Now.”

“We will not,” says Arthur. “Merlin.”

Merlin appears in the doorway, and then his mother is beside him.

“Hunith, is it not,” says Uther, something calculating coming into his gaze. His eyes flick from her to Arthur, and then to Merlin.

“So,” says Uther. “The crown prince would give up Camelot for a village hovel. Will you raise sons here, then, _Arthur Pendragon_?”

Hunith stiffens and steps forward, and Merlin freezes in sheer terror, unable even to reach out. She's going to give the king of Albion a piece of her mind. He'll have her killed.

“Sons or no sons, Your Majesty,” she says, folding her arms and glaring up at Uther from her full five foot nothing, “it's a poor home that a prince would give up for the sake of a village like this. And not even in his own kingdom. Has this prince no kingly father, who takes pride in him? No queen for a mother, to care for him?”

Merlin sees Arthur's eyes widen, just a fraction, at that. Hunith knows Arthur's mother is dead, Merlin's told her, and he told Arthur so too. What on earth is she doing?

Uther's expression freezes, and Hunith stares at him levelly, her tired blue eyes unflinching. Merlin comes forward, out of the doorway, and stands at her shoulder. On the other side of her, Arthur shifts a little, closing the space between Hunith and himself; and suddenly, it's not Hunith staring Uther down, it's all three of them.

 

 

And as Hunith looks long and hard into the pale blue eyes of the king, a barely perceptible change comes over Uther Pendragon. No longer is he a cold and regal figure; within that armour of necessity and pride a soul stirs. The soul of a man who has known love, and lost it. Hunith sees that, just as clearly as anyone.

“I cannot offer much, King Uther,” she says quietly, “but I invite you to share my table, in friendship.”

There's a long pause, and then Uther beckons a servant, and tosses him the reins of his horse. And on the ground, of a height with his son, he is no longer a king; merely a man. Merlin holds open the door of his home, and sees acknowledgement in Uther's eyes as he passes through.


End file.
